Art in Wilderness is a project of Sky Island Alliance to connect people with their wild public lands and to showcase the Tumacacori Highlands of southern Arizona...

One spring weekend, Sky Island Alliance invited several local artists to go hiking and camping with us in the Tumacacori Highlands to see, experience, learn about, and connect with the place. From that experience has come a range of artwork photographs, paintings, essays, poems, songs all inspired by and celebrating this very special place.

The result: A magical collection from 19 renown artists, poets, writers, photographers... over 100 pages of beautiful, full-color reproductions of original art, essays and poems... including two CDs with music and readings... As inspiring as the wild lands they seek to protect...

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100% of the proceeds support the Tumacacori Wilderness effort!
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Participating Artists | Excerpts

Participating Artists

Richard Shelton - Chuck Bowden - Alison Deming - Ken Lamberton - Kevin Pakulis - Sarah Kucerova
Sharon Holnback - Diana Madaras - Mary Lucking - Diana Stirling - Cantrell Maryott - Tim Lengerich - Michael Berman
Jason Zuzga - Chip Hedgcock - Bob Van Deven - Adriel Heisey - Chris Bondante - Murray Bolesta

A Sample of Excerpts

Richard Shelton: Listen to an excerpt of the essay [mp3 file]

"...It is April in the Tumacacori Highlands near the Mexican border. The large open spaces between the oaks are covered with tawny grass.

...Oaks here are deciduous in the spring, so the leaves vary from green to gold to brown, and a few are falling constantly. The temperature is perfect. I want to go back to sleep, but at my age when you've had a ten-minute nap, you can't go back to sleep again for a long time. You just lie there and think. Shakespeare says Yond Cassius has a lean and hungry look; He thinks too much: such men are dangerous. I want to be a dangerous man in the time I have left..."

Chuck Bowden: Listen to an excerpt of the essay [mp3 file]

"...I looked out at a landscape of dry grass and green oaks, the trees evenly spaced like in a model railroad layout, and was struck dumb by the ground, that moment they now call imprinting, where some things make an impression that can neither be explained nor removed.

...For 40 years this tract has been the playing field of my fantasy life, the place where there is space, silence, and hills no one has yet broken to a name.

...By June the well pretty much went dry, with late July came the rains, and by the end of November the last hummingbird had fled and did not return until February, when the Arizona holly bloomed. The snow came in the night but left by noon. When it got real dry, a rattlesnake moved onto the porch, but it left with the rains. I saw a red bolt of lightning split an oak and savored the smell lingering in the air..."

Alison Deming: Listen to an excerpt of the poem [mp3 file]

Jason Zuzga: Listen to an excerpt of the poem [mp3 file]

Kevin Pakulis: Listen to an excerpt of the song Jaguar Blues [mp3 file]

Richard Shelton, Cantrell Maryott and Kevin Pakulis: Listen to an excerpt of the song Nobody Knows [mp3 file]